Photo by Jon Anderson
Brooke Wedgworth is director of curriculum and instruction for Vestavia Hills City Schools.
Brooke Wedgworth is the director of curriculum and instruction for Vestavia Hills City Schools.
Q: How long have you been in education?
A: I’ve been in education since 1998. I started teaching middle school then. I taught middle school math and then was employed in the Vestavia school system after that and started teaching elementary school. I taught fourth and fifth grade at Central, then I taught third grade at Liberty Park and stayed home for a few years. And I was a part-time interventionist at Cahaba Heights Elementary doing K [kindergarten] through fifth grade intervention, then came back to the school system full-time and taught third grade at Cahaba Heights. And then I’ve been the director of curriculum — this will be my 13th year. And I’ve worked for the ARI [Alabama Reading Initiative] department at the state for a couple of years, too. I would travel the state and do teacher training for them.
Q: What inspired you to get into education in the first place?
A: My mother, who was a high school educator. It would also be several teachers along the way, specifically my third grade teacher. Teaching was her everything. She created a community, invested in her students, and that was really her whole life. She inspired me to be an educator so much that I would leave school in third grade and go home and teach school to my stuffed animals. I tried other majors in college for about a year and then decided I was going to do what I knew I was supposed to do, which was teach.
Q: Did you ever dream about doing anything different?
A: I did. I thought I was going to be a broadcaster. I started out in communications. Then I thought I was going to do international business and realized that neither of those were really for me. I’ve worked with kids my whole life — baby-sat, worked in the nursery at church, did summer camps, volunteered with Special Olympics. I knew I was passionate about working with kids.
Q: What’s something most people might not know about you?
A: I have three boys — [including] twins who are about to go off to college. And then I have two stepdaughters as well. One of those is about to go to college. We have a farm. I love spending time at the farm fishing, hiking ,things like that.
Q: What do you love about the farm?
A: Just being away from the city and being away from everything that’s distracting. It’s just good to get away and relax, be with my family, be outside and not have to worry about what’s on TV or what’s happening on your phone. It’s just easy to get away and forget all those things.
Q: Sometime in the future, whenever you get to retirement age, would you see yourself going to live on a farm or not?
A: No, probably not live there. Maybe spend more time there. Maybe go live at the beach and start my second career.
